Pro-government group threatens to surround Hong Kong protest sites

Crunch negotiations between protesters and Beijing-backed city officials fell apart on Thursday after the govt pulled out

A Hong Kong pro-government group today said demonstrators occupying main roads to protest for full democracy would find themselves surrounded if the city's administration failed to clear the barricades.

The Blue Ribbon Movement said the authorities should dismantle three sites the protesters have closed to traffic by Tuesday night or they would encircle them, as the city's political deadlock enters its third week.

"If the HK government will not do that, we're planning to surround those people who occupy Mong Kok, Causeway Bay and Admiralty," Tsoi Hak-kin, vice chairman of the pro-government movement told AFP.

"Hong Kong people have suffered too much," Tsoi said, without giving further details of how or when the group would surround sites that have attracted tens of thousands in the past two weeks, far outnumbering the turnout of counter-protesters.

In August, a network of pro-Beijing groups organised an anti-Occupy protest march that drew tens of thousands -- although there were allegations that some protesters were paid or bussed in from the mainland.

Crunch negotiations between protesters and Beijing-backed city officials were scheduled for yesterday but fell apart Thursday after the government pulled out, blaming protesters for threatening to expand their campaign.

"The meeting and the dialogue should be based on the decision made by the National People's Congress Standing Committee on August 31," chief secretary Carrie Lam told reporters in Guangzhou where she is attending a trade forum.

Lam's comment referred to a decision adopted by China's rubber stamp parliament that candidates would have to be preselected by a committee of fewer than 1,200 people dominated by Beijing loyalists in order to appear on the ballot paper.

More than 1,000 protesters and around 100 tents were seen in the Admiralty region of Hong Kong early today night after 15,000 took part in a mass rally on yesterday.

But tempers are fraying in the semi-autonomous territory, with shop owners losing lucrative business and commuters voicing irritation at their disrupted journeys to work.